The domestic cat (Felis catus or Felis
silvestris catus) is a small, usually furry, domesticated, and carnivorous
mammal. It is often called the housecat when kept as an indoor pet or simply
the cat when there is no need to distinguish it from other felids and felines.
Cats are often valued by humans for companionship and their ability to hunt
vermin and household pests.

Cats are similar in anatomy to the other
felids, with strong, flexible bodies, quick reflexes, sharp retractable claws,
and teeth adapted to killing small prey. Cat senses fit a crepuscular and
predatory ecological niche. Cats can hear sounds too faint or too high in
frequency for human ears, such as those made by mice and other small game. They
can see in near darkness. Like most other mammals, cats have poorer color
vision and a better sense of smell than humans.

Despite being solitary hunters, cats are a
social species, and cat communication includes the use of a variety of
vocalizations (meowing, purring, trilling, hissing, growling and grunting) as
well as cat pheromones and types of cat-specific body language.

Cats have a rapid breeding rate. Under
controlled breeding, they can be bred and shown as registered pedigree pets, a
hobby known as cat fancy. Failure to control the breeding of pet cats by
spaying and neutering, and the abandonment of former household pets, has
resulted in large numbers of feral cats worldwide, requiring population
control.

Since cats were cult animals in ancient Egypt,
they were commonly believed to have been domesticated there, but there may have
been instances of domestication as early as the Neolithic.

A genetic study in 2007 revealed that domestic
cats are descended from African wildcats (Felis silvestris lybica) c. 8000 BCE,
in the Middle East. According to Scientific American, cats are the most popular pet in
the world, and are now found almost every place where people live.

Dog

The domestic dog
(Canis lupus familiaris) is a subspecies of the gray wolf (Canis lupus), a
member of the Canidae family of the mammalian order Carnivora. The term
"domestic dog" is generally used for both domesticated and feral
varieties. The dog was the first domesticated animal and has been the most
widely kept working, hunting, and pet animal in human history. The word
"dog" can also refer to the male of a canine species, as opposed to
the word "bitch" which refers to the female of the species.

MtDNA * evidence
shows an evolutionary split between the modern dog's lineage and the modern
wolf's lineage around 100,000 years ago but, as of 2013, the oldest fossil
specimens genetically linked to the modern dog's lineage date to approximately
33,000–36,000 years ago. Dogs' value to early human hunter-gatherers led to
them quickly becoming ubiquitous across world cultures. Dogs perform many roles
for people, such as hunting, herding, pulling loads, protection, assisting
police and military, companionship, and, more recently, aiding handicapped
individuals. This impact on human society has given them the nickname
"man's best friend" in the Western world. In some cultures, however,
dogs are also a source of meat. In 2001, there were estimated to be 400 million
dogs in the world.

Most breeds of
dogs are at most a few hundred years old, having been artificially selected for
particular morphologies and behaviors by people for specific functional roles.
Through this selective breeding, the dog has developed into hundreds of varied
breeds, and shows more behavioral and morphological variation than any other
land mammal. For example, height measured to the withers ranges from 15.2
centimetres (6.0 in) in the Chihuahua to about 76 cm (30 in) in the Irish
Wolfhound; color varies from white through grays (usually called
"blue") to black, and browns from light (tan) to dark
("red" or "chocolate") in a wide variation of patterns;
coats can be short or long, coarse-haired to wool-like, straight, curly, or
smooth. It is common for most breeds to shed this coat.

* (Mitochondrial
DNA (mtDNA or mDNA) is the DNA located in organelles called mitochondria,
structures within eukaryotic cells that convert the chemical energy from food
into a form that cells can use, adenosine triphosphate (ATP). Most of the rest
of the DNA present in eukaryotic cells can be found in the cell nucleus, and in
plants, the chloroplast as well.)

Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Civil rights leader Martin Luther King
ended his landmark “I have a dream” speech 50 years ago. "I Have a
Dream" is a public speech delivered by American clergyman and activist
Martin Luther King, Jr. on August 28, 1963, in which he
called for an end to racism in the United States. Delivered to over 250,000 civil rights supporters from the steps
of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington, the
speech was a defining moment of the American Civil Rights Movement.

"I have a dream that one day this nation
will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these
truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal." I have a dream
that one day on the red hills of Georgia
the sons of former slaves and the sons of former slave owners will be able to
sit down together at a table of brotherhood. I have a dream that one day even
the state of Mississippi, a state, sweltering with the heat of injustice and sweltering with
the heat of oppression, will be transformed into an oasis of freedom and
justice. I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a
nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the
content of their character. I have a dream today."

I Have a Dream that one day we all will be able
to sit down together at a table of brotherhood.

Tuesday, August 27, 2013

"How Much Is That Doggie in the
Window?" is a popular novelty song published as having been written by Bob
Merrill in 1952 and very loosely based on the folk tune, Carnival of Venice.
The best-known version of the song was the original, recorded by Patti Page on December 18, 1952 and released in January 1953 by Mercury

Year Of The Cat, by Al Stewart

"Year of the Cat" is the seventh studio album
by Al Stewart, released in 1976 and engineered by Alan Parsons; it is
considered his masterpiece, its sales helped by the hit single "Year of
the Cat", "one of those 'mysterious woman' songs," co-written by
Peter Wood. The other single from the album was "On the Border".
Stewart wrote "Lord Grenville" about the Elizabethan sailor and
explorer Sir Richard Grenville (1542–1591).

Cat Scratch Fever, by Ted Nugent

"Cat Scratch Fever" (1977) is the third
studio album by American guitarist Ted Nugent and his band, as well as the name
of the album's title song. Vocalist Derek St. Holmes, who had left the band
during the recording of the album Free-for-All, had come back for touring in
1976 and was again the lead singer on this album.

Black Dog, by Led Zeppelin

"Black Dog" is a song by English
rock band Led Zeppelin, the opening track on their fourth album (1971). It was
released as a single in the U.S.A and in Australia
with "Misty Mountain Hop" as the B-side, reaching #15 on Billboard
and #11 in Australia.

In 2010, the song was ranked #300 on
Rolling Stone's list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. Music sociologist
Deena Weinstein calls "Black Dog" "one of the most instantly
recognisable Led Zeppelin tracks".

Cat's In The Cradle, by Harry Chapin

"Cat's in the Cradle" is a 1974
folk rock song by Harry Chapin from the album Verities & Balderdash. The
single topped the Billboard Hot 100 in December 1974 and also peaked at number
six on the Easy Listening chart. As Chapin's only #1 hit song, it became the
best known of his work and a staple for folk rock music.

The Love Cats, by The Cure

"The Love Cats" is a 1983 single
by The Cure. It was the band's first Top 10 hit in the UK,
peaking at number seven, and also hit number six in Australia.
It later appeared on the compilation album Japanese Whispers. The original
UK-only single appears to list the title as "The Lovecats", as do
various compilations.

I love my dog. by Cat Stevens

"I Love My Dog" is a song written
by Cat Stevens, and it was his first single (b/w "Portobello Road"),
showing up on his debut album, Matthew and Son. Stevens later acknowledged that
the song has been inspired by Yusef Lateef's "The Plum Blossom" (from
Eastern Sounds) with which it shares a melody.

The phrase
isn't related to the well-known antipathy between dogs and cats, which is
exemplified in the phrase 'fight like cat and dog'. Nor is the phrase in any
sense literal, that is, it doesn't record an incident where cats and dogs fell
from the sky. Small creatures, of the size of frogs or fish, do occasionally
get carried skywards in freak weather.

Rain of flightless animals and objects has
been reported throughout history. In first Century AD, Roman naturalist Pliny
The Elder has documented storms of frogs and fishes. In 1794, French soldiers
witnessed fall of toads from the Sky during heavy rain at Lalain, near French
city of Lille. In 1857, people from LakeCounty in California
reported fall of Sugar crystals from the Sky.

Impromptu involuntary flight must also
happen to dogs or cats from time to time, but there's no record of groups of
them being scooped up in that way and causing this phrase to be coined. Not
that we need to study English meteorological records for that - it's plainly
implausible.

One
supposed origin is that the phrase derives from mythology. Dogs and wolves were
attendants to Odin, the god of storms, and sailors associated them with rain.
Witches, who often took the form of their familiars - cats, are supposed to
have ridden the wind. Well, some evidence would be nice. There doesn't appear
to be any to support this notion.

It has also been suggested that cats and dogs
were washed from roofs during heavy weather. This is a widely repeated tale. It
got a new lease of life with the e-mail message "Life in the 1500s",
which began circulating on the Internet in 1999. Here's the relevant part of
that:

I'll
describe their houses a little. You've heard of thatch roofs, well that's all
they were. Thick straw, piled high, with no wood underneath. They were the only
place for the little animals to get warm. So all the pets; dogs, cats and other
small animals, mice, rats, bugs, all lived in the roof. When it rained it
became slippery so sometimes the animals would slip and fall off the roof. Thus
the saying, "it's raining cats and dogs."

This is
nonsense of course. It hardly needs debunking but, lest there be any doubt,
let's do that anyway. In order to believe this tale we would have to accept
that dogs lived in thatched roofs, which, of course, they didn't. Even
accepting that bizarre idea, for dogs to have slipped off when it rained they
would have needed to be sitting on the outside of the thatch - hardly the place
an animal would head for as shelter in bad weather.

Another
suggestion is that 'raining cats and dogs' comes from a version of the French
word 'catadoupe', meaning waterfall. Again, no evidence. If the phrase were
just 'raining cats', or even if there also existed a French word 'dogadoupe',
we might be going somewhere with this one. As there isn't, let's pass this by.

There's a
similar phrase originating from the North of England - 'raining stair-rods'. No
one has gone to the effort of speculating that this is from mythic reports of
stairs being carried into the air in storms and falling on gullible peasants.
It's just a rather expressive phrase giving a graphic impression of heavy rain
- as is 'raining cats and dogs'.

The much
more probable source of 'raining cats and dogs' is the prosaic fact that, in
the filthy streets of 17th/18th century England, heavy rain would occasionally
carry along dead animals and other debris. The animals didn't fall from the
sky, but the sight of dead cats and dogs floating by in storms could well have
caused the coining of this colourful phrase. Jonathan Swift described such an
event in his satirical poem 'A Description of a City Shower', first published
in the 1710 collection of the Tatler magazine. The poem was a denunciation of
contemporary London society and its meaning has been much debated. While the poem is
metaphorical and doesn't describe a specific flood, it seems that, in
describing water-borne animal corpses, Swift was referring to an occurrence
that his readers would have been well familiar with:

Now in
contiguous Drops the Flood comes down,

Threat'ning with Deluge this devoted Town.

...

Now from all Parts the swelling Kennels flow,

And bear their Trophies with them as they go:

Filth of all Hues and Odours seem to tell

What Street they sail'd from, by their Sight
and Smell.

They, as each Torrent drives, with rapid
Force,

From Smithfield or St. Pulchre's shape their
Course,

And in huge Confluent join'd at Snow-Hill
Ridge,

Fall from the Conduit, prone to
Holbourn-Bridge.

Sweeping from Butchers Stalls, Dung, Guts, and
Blood,

Drown'd Puppies, stinking Sprats, all drench'd
in Mud,

Dead Cats and Turnip-Tops come tumbling down
the Flood.

We do know
that the phrase was in use in a modified form in 1653, when Richard Brome's
comedy The City Wit or The Woman Wears the Breeches referred to stormy weather
with the line:

"It
shall raine... Dogs and Polecats".

Polecats
aren't cats as such but the jump between them in linguistic rather than
veterinary terms isn't large and it seems clear that Broome's version was
essentially the same phrase. The first appearance of the currently used version
is in Jonathan Swift’s A Complete Collection of Polite and Ingenious
Conversation in 1738:

"I
know Sir John will go, though he was sure it would rain cats and dogs".

The fact
that Swift had alluded to the streets flowing with dead cats and dogs some
years earlier and now used 'rain cats and dogs' explicitly is good evidence
that poor sanitation was the source of the phrase as we now use it.

Why “cats and dogs”?

Again, we don’t know for certain.
Etymologists—people who study the origins of words—have suggested a variety of
mythological and literal explanations for why people say “it’s raining cats and
dogs” to describe a heavy downpour. Here are some of the popular theories:

Odin,
the Norse god of storms, was often pictured with dogs and wolves, which were
symbols of wind. Witches, who supposedly rode their brooms during storms, were
often pictured with black cats, which became signs of heavy rain for sailors.
Therefore, “raining cats and dogs” may refer to a storm with wind (dogs) and
heavy rain (cats).

“Cats
and dogs” may come from the Greek expression cata doxa, which means “contrary
to experience or belief.” If it is raining cats and dogs, it is raining
unusually or unbelievably hard.

“Cats
and dogs” may be a perversion of the now obsolete word catadupe. In old
English, catadupe meant a cataract or waterfall. A version of catadupe existed
in many old languages.In Latin, for example, catadupa. was borrowed from the
classical Greek κατάδουποι, which referred to the cataracts of the NileRiver. So, to
say it’s raining “cats and dogs” might be to say it’s raining waterfalls.

A
false theory stated that cats and dogs used to cuddle into thatch roofs during
storms and then be washed out during heavy rains. However, a properly
maintained thatch roof is naturally water resistant and slanted to allow water
to run off. In order to slip off the roof, the animals would have to be lying
on the outside—an unlikely place for an animal to seek shelter during a storm.

My lower
part of the trunk was surgically removed to protect me for any Sexually
transmitted diseases (STD). Sure I had to keep my mouth shut and that was the toughest
job, Sunday at the safe sex party in Sweetgrass. But all these sacrificing made
me a winner.

Wednesday, August 21, 2013

A tattoo is
a form of body modification, made by inserting indelible ink into the dermis
layer of the skin to change the pigment.

History of the
word

The Oxford
English Dictionary gives the etymology of tattoo as,

"In 18th c. tattaow,
tattow. From Polynesian tatau. In Tahitian, tatu." The word tatau was
introduced as a loan word into English; its pronunciation was changed to
conform to English phonology as "tattoo". Sailors on later voyages
both introduced the word and reintroduced the concept of tattooing to Europe.

The first
written reference to the word, "tattoo" (or Samoan "Tatau")
appears in the journal of Joseph Banks (24 February 1743 – 19 June 1820), the
naturalist aboard Captain Cook's ship the HMS Endeavour: "I shall now
mention the way they mark themselves indelibly, each of them is so marked by
their humor or disposition".

The word
"tattoo" was brought to Europe by the explorer James Cook, when he returned
in 1771 from his first voyage to Tahiti and New Zealand. In his narrative of the voyage, he
refers to an operation called "tattaw". Before this it had been
described as scarring, painting, or staining.

Tattoo
enthusiasts may refer to tattoos as "ink", "pieces",
"skin art", "tattoo art", "tats", or
"work"; to the creators as "tattoo artists",
"tattooers", or "tattooists"; and to places where they work
as "tattoo shops", "tattoo studios", or "tattoo
parlours".

Usage of
the terms "skin art", "tattoo art", "pieces", and
work" is gaining greater support, with mainstream art
galleries holding exhibitions of both conventional and custom tattoo designs.
Beyond Skin, at the Museum of Croydon, is an example of this as it
challenges the stereotypical view of tattoos and who has them. Copyrighted
tattoo designs that are mass-produced and sent to tattoo artists are known as
"flash", a notable instance of industrial design. Flash sheets are
prominently displayed in many tattoo parlors for the purpose of providing both
inspiration and ready-made tattoo images to customers.

The
Japanese word irezumi means "insertion of ink" and can mean tattoos
using tebori, the traditional Japanese hand method, a Western-style machine, or
for that matter, any method of tattooing using insertion of ink. The most
common word used for traditional Japanese tattoo designs is Horimono. Japanese
may use the word "tattoo" to mean non-Japanese styles of tattooing.

Anthropologist
Ling Roth in 1900 described four methods of skin marking and suggested they be
differentiated under the names "tatu", "moko",
"cicatrix", and "keloid".

History

Tattooing
has been practiced for centuries in many cultures, particularly in Asia, and spread throughout the world.
The Ainu, an indigenous people of Japan, traditionally had facial tattoos, as
did the Austroasians whose language spread from Taiwan into southern China and
southeast Asia. Today, one can find Atayal, Seediq, Truku, and Saisiyat of
Taiwan, Berbers of Tamazgha (North Africa), Yoruba, Fulani and Hausa people
of Nigeria, and Māori of New Zealand with facial tattoos.

Tattooing
was popular in southern China and among the Polynesians, as well
asamong certain tribal groups in Africa, Borneo, Cambodia, Europe, Japan, the MentawaiIslands, MesoAmerica, New Zealand, North America and South America, the Philippines, and Taiwan. The modern revival in tattooing
stems from the voyage of Captain James Cook in the late 1700s. Cook's Science
Officer and Expedition Botanist, Sir Joseph Banks, returned to England with a tattoo. Banks was a highly
regarded member of the English aristocracy and had acquired his position with
Cook by putting up what was at the time the princely sum of some ten thousand
pounds in the expedition. In turn, Cook brought back with him a tattooed
Raiatean man, Omai, whom he presented to King George and the English Court. Many of Cook's men, ordinary
seamen and sailors, came back with tattoos, a tradition that would soon become
associated with men of the sea in the public's mind and the press of the day.
In the process sailors and seamen re-introduced the practice of tattooing in Europe and it spread rapidly to seaports
around the globe.

As many
tattoos were stimulated by Polynesian and Japanese examples, amateur tattoo
artists were in great demand in port cities all over the world, especially by
European and American sailors. The first documented professional tattoo artist
in the USA was Martin Hildebrandt, a German immigrant who
arrived in Boston, Massachusetts in 1846. Between 1861 and 1865, he
tattooed soldiers on both sides in the American Civil War. The first documented
professional tattooist in Britain was established in Liverpool in the 1870s. Tattooing was an
expensive and painful process, and by the 1870s had become a mark of wealth for
the crowned heads of Europe.

Since the
1970s, tattoos have become a mainstream part of Western fashion, common among
both sexes, to all economic classes, and to age groups from the later teen
years to middle age. For many young Americans, the tattoo has taken on a
decidedly different meaning than for previous generations. The tattoo has
"undergone dramatic redefinition" and has shifted from a form of
deviance to an acceptable form of expression. In 2010, 25% of Australians under
age 30 had tattoos.

Monday, August 19, 2013

"Tattoo"
is a song by American recording artist Jordin Sparks, taken from her
self-titled debut album. Written by Amanda Ghost, Ian Dench and Stargate, with
the latter also producing the song, "Tattoo" was released on August
27, 2007 as the lead single from the album.

"Tattoo"
received mixed to positive reviews from critics, who noted its similarities to
Beyoncé's 2006 hit, "Irreplaceable". The song peaked inside the top
ten in the United States, Australia and Canada, and reached the top twenty in
New Zealand and Germany. It has since been certified platinum in Australia and
the United States. The song's music video premiered on Yahoo! Music on November
2, 2007. It was directed by Matthew Rolston and features a cameo appearance
from sixth season American Idol runner-up, Blake Lewis. A second music video
for "Tattoo" was directed by Scott Speer and released only in
European countries in September 2008, due to the song failing to make an impact
on the singles charts there.

Jordin Sparks

Jordin
Brianna Sparks (born December 22, 1989) is an American singer-songwriter
and actress. In 2007, she came to prominence after winning the sixth season of
American Idol; at age 17, she became the youngest winner in the series'
history. Her self-titled debut album was released later that year; it was
certified platinum by the RIAA and has sold over two million copies worldwide.
The album spawned US Billboard Hot 100 top ten singles "Tattoo" and
"No Air"; the latter is currently the third highest-selling single by
any American Idol contestant, selling over three million digital copies in the US. The song earned Sparks her first
Grammy Award nomination for Best Pop Collaboration with Vocals.

"Tattoo"
was written by Amanda Ghost, Ian Dench and Norwegian production team StarGate,
with the latter also producing the track. According to Sparks, she loved the song the first time
she heard it and immediately wanted to record it. In an interview with Digital
Spy, she spoke of the song saying:

"Tattoo's
a song that can go so many different ways. Some people think of it as a
break-up song, but, for me, it's about somebody who comes into your life and
really touches you - be they a friend, a family member or someone you're in a
relationship with. You know, with that kind of person, you can't just erase
them from your memory if things go wrong. They're stuck there like a tattoo."

Music video

The
European version of the music video was directed by Scott Speer and was filmed
to coincide with the song's re-release in Europe, due to the lack of interest of the original.
The video was released in September 2008. It features Sparks in a room with
several other people, at what appears to be a college gathering. As she begins
to sing, Sparks is shown with a "love" tattoo on her upper arm, as vines draw
themselves down her arm. Following this, the ink begins to appear on the others
and the floors of the room, creating tattoos in the process. Some of the people
in the room are couples, and the tattoos seem to bring them closer. The created
tattoos depict images and words, such as a heart or the words "free"
and "peace." Sparks is also shown by herself in an
empty room, with a mirror covering the wall throughout. During one point, Sparks self-consciously looks in the
mirror, coinciding with the song lyric "when I looked in the mirror,
didn't deliver." There are also recurring shots of Sparks in another room against a green
wall.

Same as Saturday at our party, there were
also at Sweetgrass fewer guests than normally.

Is it the theme, the deejay or just a coincidence?
It is difficult to explain in any case.

For the second week in row I was one of the
winners.

On 17 November 1825,
the Swiss chocolatier Philippe Suchard (1797–1884) established a pâtisserie in
Neuchâtel, where he sold a hand-made dessert named chocolat fin de sa fabrique
and began manufacturing chocolates the next year. In 1901 the Suchard company
had the Milka trademark registered. According to the official site
www.milka.co.uk, the name is derived from combining Milch and Kakao, which are
the German terms for milk and cocoa, chocolate's primary ingredients. However,
Croatian sources claim it to be a tribute to Carl Russ-Suchard's admiration of
Richard Wagner interpretations by Milka Ternina (1863–1941), a famous soprano
of the time. The chocolates are distinctively packaged in purple.

The brand has a well-known symbol, a Purple
Cow, which is a lilac coloured Simmental cattle (Fleckvieh) which are normally
brown-white, with a completely white face. A cow was already depicted on the early
chocolate packing in 1901 and appeared in billboard advertising from the 1950s
onwards. A first ad campaign displaying a dyed living cow was launched by Young
& Rubicam in 1972. Today the Milka Cow sports a bell around her neck, and
is usually shown in an Alpine meadow surrounding.